Saturday marks three years since a MacMurray student was found in his home with a gunshot wound and investigators are still searching for the teenager’s murderer.
At 11:38 pm on Tuesday, November 19th, 2019, Jacksonville Police discovered 19-year-old Maurice Cunningham unresponsive after suffering from a gunshot wound inside his residence at 618 Jordan Street.
A native of Streator, Illinois, Cunningham was attending MacMurray College studying business management and was also a member of the football team at the time he was killed. He was transported to Springfield Memorial Hospital after he was found by authorities where he later died as a result of his injuries on Friday, November 22nd.
A year ago, Crime Stoppers of Morgan, Scott, and Cass Counties announced they will pay the maximum cash award allowed by IRS regulations for any tips that lead to the arrest of the person, or persons involved in Cunningham’s death.
Lt. Doug Thompson with the Jacksonville Police Division of Investigation says the case is not considered cold, however, the trail has become sparse. “We have leads we are working on. We have people that call up and say they have information and then no matter how small it is or no matter how trustworthy or untrustworthy that person is, we follow up on it and see if it will send us to a different lead or new lead, or give us any information that we don’t have.
So currently it’s still active. The original investigator that was handling the case has left the department and retired so I had to assign it to a new detective. He has been familiarizing himself with that case.”
Thompson says the case remains status quo and that they have received a couple of new leads recently. However, those have not developed into anything substantial at this time. He says that doesn’t mean it won’t develop into something more later, but investigators are still trying to track down information the leads claim to be true.
Thompson says investigators would like to speak with some of those who were interviewed initially after Cunningham was shot, along with anyone who might have new information.
“This incident obviously occurred in 2019. We talked to several people initially and we believe that those people may have new information or have more information that they were unwilling to provide to us at that time. We’d love for them to come back in and visit with us.
We would like to try and reach out to them. If they hear this before we find them, please contact us. If you hear anything, no matter how small it is, make sure that you do either call Crime Stoppers or the Police Department. We will track down any lead that we are given, regardless of how small or how trivial it may seem to you, it could be one little piece of that puzzle we need to help determine who did this.”
This week Crime Stoppers is reaching out to the public for any information on the unsolved Maurice Cunningham murder case in lieu of the usual Crime of the Week.
Police ask that if you know anything about the homicide of Maurice Cunningham do not hesitate to call the Jacksonville Police Department investigations at 217-479-4636 or submit an anonymous tip to Crime Stoppers at 217-243-7300.